{ "source": "Cooked Index — occupational AI risk register", "page": "https://cookedindex.com/jobs/tool-grinders-filers-and-sharpeners/", "methodology": "https://cookedindex.com/methodology", "notice": "Verdicts are re-examined as evidence accumulates. Re-fetch before relying on this; the page above always carries the current score.", "scored_at": "2026-08-11", "model": "claude-opus-5", "occupation": { "title": "Tool Grinders, Filers, and Sharpeners", "soc_code": "51-4194", "category": "Production", "us_employment": 5600, "median_annual_wage": 50060 }, "verdict": "EXPOSED", "risk_resistance": 37, "contested": false, "near_boundary": false, "dimensions": { "task_resistance": 11, "embodiment": 14, "liability_shield": 1, "trust_premium": 4, "judgment_accountability": 7 }, "reasoning": { "task_resistance": "Regrinding a standard end mill or hob to a fixed geometry is already a CNC cycle on a Walter or ANCA machine, but chasing a chipped form tool with no print, deciding whether a burned edge can be saved, and blending a relief by hand on a pedestal grinder still needs a person at the wheel — mixed, and the split is roughly by batch size.", "embodiment": "You are physically indexing cutters in fixtures, dressing and truing wheels, feeling for chatter, breathing coolant mist and abrasive dust, and hand-filing burrs on parts you hold — an uncontrolled shop floor, though it stops short of 18-20 because the work sits at a machine in one bay rather than on a moving jobsite.", "liability_shield": "No state licence, no board, no certification anyone asks for at hire; a machinist card or an employer's in-house sign-off is the whole credential, and a tool that fails in service is the shop's warranty problem, not yours personally.", "trust_premium": "The customer receives a resharpened cutter in a box and measures it; a long-running relationship with a local cutter-grinding shop is real but survives on turnaround and hitting the drawing, and a plant will requote to a competitor over price.", "judgment_accountability": "You decide stock removal, wheel grit, and whether a worn cutter is scrap or salvageable, which is genuine discretion on a one-off — but for the bulk of the work the print, the manufacturer's angles, and the comparator overlay tell you what right looks like." }, "rationale": "This is hands-on shop work — mounting cutters on grinding machines, dressing wheels, checking clearance angles with optical comparators and micrometers, hand-filing burrs — and none of that is text or screen work an LLM touches. The real threat isn't AI but CNC tool-and-cutter grinders and automated resharpening cells that already handle repeat geometries at volume, plus disposable carbide inserts that eliminate resharpening entirely. Employment is small (about 5,600) and has been shrinking for years; the surviving tier is the grinder who can set up and program a 5-axis CNC grinder and handle one-off, custom, or damaged tooling that no automated cycle covers.", "outlook": "Expect continued slow contraction as disposable inserts and automated regrind cells absorb the routine volume, with steady demand for the minority who program CNC grinders and handle custom or salvage tooling.", "what_would_raise_it": { "levers": [ { "dimension": "task_resistance", "change": "Task-mix shift is genuinely bifurcated here: if disposable inserts and automated resharpening cells absorb the repeat-geometry volume (already happening at Star Cutter, ANCA-equipped service shops), the residual job is one-off custom form cutters, broach and hob repair, damaged/oversize tooling and 5-axis CNC grinder setup and wheel-path programming — work with no automated cycle. Watch for the occupation's remaining postings shifting from 'grinder operator' to 'tool grinder/programmer' titles requiring Numroto or ANCA iGrind experience.", "plausibility": "already happening", "would_add": 4 }, { "dimension": "embodiment", "change": "If reshoring of aerospace and medical-device machining raises demand for on-site regrind of large or fixtured tooling (broaches, gear hobs, PCD-tipped cutters) that cannot be shipped to a centralized automated cell, the work concentrates in unpredictable manual setup — wheel dressing, in-machine probing, hand stoning of edges — rather than tended cycles.", "plausibility": "plausible", "would_add": 3 }, { "dimension": "judgment_accountability", "change": "If prime contractors push AS9100/NADCAP-style traceability down to regrind vendors — requiring a named technician to certify that a resharpened cutter meets original clearance/rake spec and to disposition tools with heat-check or micro-chipping as scrap vs. salvage — the call on a $4,000 cutter and the part it will machine becomes an owned, documented decision. Watch for regrind certificates of conformance naming an individual in aerospace supplier flowdowns.", "plausibility": "plausible", "would_add": 4 }, { "dimension": "trust_premium", "change": "Narrow route only: custom knifemaking, woodworking, and surgical/barber shear sharpening where buyers pay named craftsmen and refuse machine-only service. This is a different market, not the industrial occupation, and cannot absorb 5,600 workers.", "plausibility": "unlikely", "would_add": 1 } ], "ceiling_note": "Liability shield is effectively unreachable — there is no license, no board, no personal signature requirement anywhere in tool grinding, and none has ever been proposed. Even with every lever above, the ceiling is roughly the mid-40s, and it sits on top of a shrinking base: disposable carbide inserts remove the work rather than automate it, so headcount can fall while the surviving role gets harder to displace." }, "adjudication": null, "employment_history": { "points": [ { "y": 2017, "emp": 8060, "wage": 36390 }, { "y": 2018, "emp": 7070, "wage": 38140 }, { "y": 2019, "emp": 6440, "wage": 39330 }, { "y": 2020, "emp": 6080, "wage": 41060 }, { "y": 2021, "emp": 6100, "wage": 38430 }, { "y": 2022, "emp": 5320, "wage": 41940 }, { "y": 2023, "emp": 6660, "wage": 46410 }, { "y": 2024, "emp": 5730, "wage": 48970 }, { "y": 2025, "emp": 5600, "wage": 50060 } ], "from": 2017, "to": 2025, "change_pct": -30.5, "comparable_from": 2019, "spans_soc_revision": true }, "pivots": [ { "slug": "refractory-materials-repairers-except-brickmasons", "title": "Refractory Materials Repairers, Except Brickmasons", "verdict": "EXPOSED", "risk_resistance": 65, "median_wage": 61290, "overlap": 84, "skills_to_close": [ "Coordination" ] }, { "slug": "automotive-body-and-related-repairers", "title": "Automotive Body and Related Repairers", "verdict": "EXPOSED", "risk_resistance": 65, "median_wage": 54890, "overlap": 82, "skills_to_close": [ "Installation", "Service Orientation", "Coordination", "Speaking" ] }, { "slug": "industrial-machinery-mechanics", "title": "Industrial Machinery Mechanics", "verdict": "SAFE", "risk_resistance": 67, "median_wage": 64520, "overlap": 81, "skills_to_close": [ "Installation", "Troubleshooting", "Science", "Systems Evaluation" ] } ], "license": "https://cookedindex.com/terms" }